Omer Fast

Omer Fast

11. January - 9. February, 2013

Arratia Beer is very pleased to present Omer Fast's most recent works: Continuity(2012) and 5000 Feet is the Best (2011).

Omer Fast's works examine how individual and collective histories interact. Focusing on narratives, Fast mixes sound and image into stories that test the line between personal and media accounts of current and historical events. In his concern with the strategies of digital manipulation and perception, Fast's work draws attention to the permeable boundaries between documentary and fiction.

5000 is the Best is based on conversations the artist recorded with a US Predator drone aerial vehicle operator. The drone operator agreed to discuss the technical aspects of his job and his daily routine on camera. He also briefly described live-fire missions, in which the unmanned plane "engaged targets" in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and the psychological difficulties he experienced as a result. The resulting film forms a circular plot that returns fitfully to the voice and blurred face of the drone pilot and to his unfinished story.

Continuity is Fast's latest work. It follows a middle-aged German couple as they emotionally reunite with a young soldier just back from service in Afghanistan. What first appears to be a straight-forward family drama becomes increasingly tangled: A series of young men spend the night with the couple, repeatedly reenacting a ritual whose ostensible purpose is mourning but which repeatedly slips into the oedipal and the uncanny. Continuity was commissioned by dOCUMENTA (13) and Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, with the support of 3sat, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg GmbH, Berlin, and OK Offenes Kulturhaus Oberösterreich and produced by Filmgalerie 451, Berlin.

Omer Fast (born 1972, Jerusalem) lives and works in Berlin. He was the recipient of the 2009 Preis der Nationalgalerie für Junge Kunst and the 2008 Bucksbaum Award. Fast has had solo exhibitions at the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus; The Power Plant, Toronto; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Berkeley Art Museum; Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, Oslo; Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne; La Caixa Forum, Barcelona; South London Gallery, London and MUMOK- Museum Moderner Kunst Stifung Ludwig, Vienna. His work has been included in LLUMInations, 54th Venice Biennale, dOCUMENTA (13), Performa 09, the 2008 and 2002 Whitney Biennials and Liverpool Biennial 2008 as well as group exhibitions at institutions such as Centre Pompidou, Paris; ZKM, Karlsruhe; Barbican Art Gallery, London and The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC, among other venues.

Omer Fast

Omer Fast

11. January - 9. February, 2013

Arratia Beer is very pleased to present Omer Fast's most recent works: Continuity(2012) and 5000 Feet is the Best (2011).

Omer Fast's works examine how individual and collective histories interact. Focusing on narratives, Fast mixes sound and image into stories that test the line between personal and media accounts of current and historical events. In his concern with the strategies of digital manipulation and perception, Fast's work draws attention to the permeable boundaries between documentary and fiction.

5000 is the Best is based on conversations the artist recorded with a US Predator drone aerial vehicle operator. The drone operator agreed to discuss the technical aspects of his job and his daily routine on camera. He also briefly described live-fire missions, in which the unmanned plane "engaged targets" in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and the psychological difficulties he experienced as a result. The resulting film forms a circular plot that returns fitfully to the voice and blurred face of the drone pilot and to his unfinished story.

Continuity is Fast's latest work. It follows a middle-aged German couple as they emotionally reunite with a young soldier just back from service in Afghanistan. What first appears to be a straight-forward family drama becomes increasingly tangled: A series of young men spend the night with the couple, repeatedly reenacting a ritual whose ostensible purpose is mourning but which repeatedly slips into the oedipal and the uncanny. Continuity was commissioned by dOCUMENTA (13) and Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, with the support of 3sat, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg GmbH, Berlin, and OK Offenes Kulturhaus Oberösterreich and produced by Filmgalerie 451, Berlin.

Omer Fast (born 1972, Jerusalem) lives and works in Berlin. He was the recipient of the 2009 Preis der Nationalgalerie für Junge Kunst and the 2008 Bucksbaum Award. Fast has had solo exhibitions at the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus; The Power Plant, Toronto; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Berkeley Art Museum; Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, Oslo; Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne; La Caixa Forum, Barcelona; South London Gallery, London and MUMOK- Museum Moderner Kunst Stifung Ludwig, Vienna. His work has been included in LLUMInations, 54th Venice Biennale, dOCUMENTA (13), Performa 09, the 2008 and 2002 Whitney Biennials and Liverpool Biennial 2008 as well as group exhibitions at institutions such as Centre Pompidou, Paris; ZKM, Karlsruhe; Barbican Art Gallery, London and The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC, among other venues.